Fate of the World, a ground-breaking download game based on state-of-the-art climate models and input from top scientists, is set to launch on Monday 28th February 2011. Red Redemption – the Oxford-based developers of this innovative strategy game – have partnered with the global TckTckTck campaign to help garner support for climate action.

Fate of the World works on the principal that people are ‘players’ in the climate change debate and can contribute towards real-life changes. A charity edition of the game is downloadable from www.tcktcktck.org/fotwgame with a percentage of proceeds going to support the campaign.

“Playing and promoting Fate of the World means breaking new ground for the climate movement, as this is an unusual type of campaign tool with a rare mix of fun, science, strategy and action. Gamers who download Fate of the World via the tcktcktck.org website directly support climate campaigns”, said Paul Horsman, Campaign Director at the Global Campaign for Climate Action that runs TckTckTck. (ENDS)

In Fate of the World gamers must find a way to deal with Earth’s ever-depleting resources and the climate crisis, whilst reconciling the needs of a growing world population that demands more food, energy, and living space. The game seeks to increase the understanding and awareness of climate change by providing gamers with the opportunity to learn and explore the subject in ways never before available.

Fate of the World is an innovative way to reach out to people, using a new framework for discussing environmental issues and exploring contemporary policy debates. Whilst playing it, gamers engage with principles like technology development, food security and wildlife adaptation, and impose policies such as banning logging in the Amazon rainforest or making all Europe’s public transport run on electricity. They can also play a reverse scenario and destroy the planet, thus learning how possible it is, in fact, to do just that.

The PC English language version of Fate of the World will be available to download at www.tcktcktck.org/fotwgame on 28 February 2011. The game is priced at £9.90 (EUR 14), with a percentage of proceeds going to TckTckTck.

United Nations Press Conference Discussion Panel, Dec. 6th, CoP 16, Cancun

A deal is surfacing at the CoP 16 in Cancun. The UNFCCC’s Executive Secretary Ms. Christiana Figueres is sure that “there is a deal to be done here” and “differences are not insurmountable”. Countries have begun to realize that they have to go beyond their national positions to tackle a problem superseding their short-term national interests.

“We [the UN] have to bridge the gap between the rich and the poor” and help countries understand that there are two huge challenges – climate change and poverty. At this moment, there is not a single nation on the planet which can say ‘this is a model for green growth’. Yet, economic and social growth are what the UN aims for.

United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon framed the issue in the following way:

“These days, you cannot think of anything without starting with the topic of climate change. Poverty, food security, energy security, water security, and nutrition security, and even now peace and security. The impact of climate change has been working as a source of conflict and if not properly addressed can develop into a much bigger crisis. We have to link all these parts for the security and address them comprehensively.”

In this direction, the UNSG announced that the organization will have to address the 50-50-50 challenge: a 50% increase in population, a 50% decrease in GHG emissions, which will happen before 2050 (visit ‘50-50-50 Starts in Cancun‘ on 2Celsius.net).

Ban Ki-Moon further stated that in order to be realistic at the CoP 16, expectations of a comprehensive and legally biding agreement have to be put to rest. Yet, agreement can be made in Cancun on four issues:

1. Deforestation: providing adequate financial support for countries who commit to preserving forests.
2. Adaptation: providing mechanisms for all the poor people suffering from the effects of climate change.
3. Technology dissemination: “We have to disseminate as much as possible, as quickly as possible, to those developing countries who do not have any capacity to adapt and mitigate, but can use cutting-edge technology.”
4. Financing: Fast-start financial support and the pledges made by developed countries at Copenhagen have to become a reality. “I think this target is approaching and we can do it! For long term financial support, I have established a high level advisory group with the aim of mobilizing 100 bilion dollars per year until 2020.”

The UNSG did not lack optimism in saying that a deal can be struck between the parties on these issues and the UN’s bodies can cooperate to tackle a range of issues together. Also, there is now way that any country, even the biggest one, can achieve this on its own. Multilateral cooperation is stressed by many as the most important aspect of this process.

United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon at UN Press Conference, CoP 16, Cancun

Yet, where is the link between climate change and development? Ms. Maria Ignacia Benitez, Minister of Environment of Chile stated: “poverty makes us more vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change”. It also makes the access to a solution more difficult. This exemplifies a threat to the integrity of the social system. Realizing that “mitigation and adaptation can result in commonwealth for poor people” was the main message Ms. Benitez portrayed.

The main challenge faced by the UN is how to make green growth more inclusive. In other words, how to bring green growth to people who do not have access to clean water. A concrete action-plan under the UNFCCC would address these issues and would allow UNEP, UNDP and UNIDO to cooperate fully in tackling climate change and poverty at the same time.

Concluding a deal on these issues at Cancun will not be easy. Yet, with the UN Secretary-General calling on civil society and indigenous communities to establish a “trilateral pillar” with the aim of “making world leaders move”, he expressed his confidence that everyone can work together. This will add “political heat” through strong commitment by all.

Indonesia could save $1 billion a year and cut its greenhouse gas emissions by eight million tones of CO2 annually—the equivalent of taking two million cars off the road a year—by switching to energy-saving bulbs, reads a UNEP press release.

South Africa might save $280 million a year and remove emissions equal to
625,000 cars annually by following a similar path, say findings released,
Wednesday, at the climate convention meeting by the UN Environment
Programme (UNEP).

Mexico would save $900 million, reducing 5 million tones of CO2 emissions a
year in a soon to be announced plan to replace incandescent lamps in the
country. With the electricity saved from this small shift, 3 coal power
plants would become unnecessary.

It is expected that Brazil will save $ 2 billion a year and 4 million tones
of CO2 –the equivalent emissions from 1 million cars – when legislation in
the country is finalized, by mid 2012.

For the Ukraine, an economy in transition, the cost savings could be $210
million per annum with greenhouse gas reductions of 2 million tones of CO2
a year—equal to taking half a million cars off the road annually.

Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary General and UNEP Executive Director,
said: “In reality, the actual economic benefits could be even higher. A
switch to efficient lighting in Indonesia, for example, would avoid the
need to build 3.5 coal-fired power stations costing $2.5 billion and
similar findings come from other country assessments”.

“Such calculations do not include the wider environmental, health and
‘Green Economy’ benefits to communities and countries of switching away
from, for example, fuels such as kerosene and reducing emissions from
sources such as fossil-fueled power stations—an estimated 1.8 million
deaths a year are linked with in-door and 800,000 with out-door air
pollution: more efficient lighting has a role to play here too”.

“For the past two decades, the GEF has championed market efforts to expand
efficient lighting to developing countries throughout the world,” said
Monique Barbut, CEO and Chairperson of the Global Environment Facility.
“En.lighten is the latest initiative funded by the GEF in partnership with
UNEP and leading global lighting manufacturers to accelerate market
transformation of efficient lighting technologies on a global scale.
Through this initiative, we hope to build a strong partnership with the
private sector to encourage innovation and to help those who need our help
the most build brighter futures today and for the next generation.”

The 100 Country Lighting Assessment findings have come from the ‘en.lighten initiative’—a partnership led by UNEP involving companies Osram and Philips.

The initiative, which today launched detailed market assessments of the
environmental and economic potential of a switch to efficient lighting in
100 countries, is supported by the Global Environment Facility under its
Earth Fund. The assessments analyze the benefits of shifting the obsolete
incandescent lamp technology to compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs). Larger
savings are expected to be achieved if other inefficient lighting
technologies are also substituted, such as inefficient tube lights or
inefficient halogens.

The assessments show that in Africa, a country such as Nigeria could cut
its electricity consumption by over 15 per cent in a switch to energy
efficient lighting while reducing CO2 emissions from fuel combustion by
close to five per cent.

In Asia, a country like Cambodia could save over 30 per cent of its
electricity consumption while reducing CO2 emissions by more than 13 per
cent.

In Uzbekistan, electricity consumption saving could be over 20 per cent; in
Croatia, nearly 10 per cent ; in Guatemala also close to 10 per cent and
in Yemen just over 10 per cent.

According to Wolfgang Gregor, Sr. Vice-President, Sustainability for OSRAM
GmbH, “We are not only responsible for what we are doing, but also for what
we are not doing. Multinational lighting companies can no longer neglect
the populations in developing and emerging markets. That is why OSRAM has
given its firm commitment to the en.lighten initiative, as well as to
combating the use of kerosene as a part of our off grid lighting project.”

“We believe that the en.lighten initiative is an excellent example of a
new category of public/private partnerships that will help accelerate
sustainable growth in emerging and developing countries,” says Harry
Verhaar, Sr. Director Energy & Climate Change, Philips Lighting. “The
switch to energy efficient lighting solutions represents a triple win for
these countries, as this sectoral lighting approach is also a bottom-up
initiative that compliments the top-down UNFCCC process,” he says.

A principle and readily available technology is the compact fluorescent
light bulb (CFL). Unlike old incandescent light bulbs which produce 95 per
cent heat and just five per cent light, CFLs produce an equivalent amount
of light using 75 per cent less energy. They also last up to ten times
longer than incandescent bulbs.

But some critics have pointed to the health hazardous mercury, used in
CFLs, as an issue that raises a question mark over the technology’s
environmental credentials.

Take-back schemes and the safe disposal of CFLs is clearly a key issue
which ‘en.lighten’ is also addressing—this is a central challenge,
especially in developing countries.

Meanwhile, other mercury-free technologies are also being promoted
including Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs).

Nevertheless given that the main source of new mercury emissions world-wide
is from the burning of coal, estimates indicate that overall it is far more
environmentally-friendly to switch from old bulbs to new ones.

One recent study by Yale University estimated that if the United States
switched to CFLs, the energy savings at power stations would lead to cuts
in mercury emissions of 25,000 tonnes a year.

The 100 country assessments come in the wake of a UNEP study, conducted in
collaboration with researchers from 25 leading climate modeling centres
world-wide.

This showed that if all countries met in full their pledges linked with
last year’s Copenhagen Accord, emissions by 2020 could fall to 49
Gigatonnes (billion).

It could leave a gap of 5Gt between this current ambition and where
scientists say emissions need to be in 2020 to stand a reasonable chance of
keeping a global temperature rise to less than 2 degree C by 2050.

The world needs quick wins to show that climate change can be controlled. A
global transition to efficient lighting is perhaps the easiest method. If
achieved swiftly, this victory would generate the momentum needed to
achieve greater CO2 reductions in other sectors and assist towards
stabilizing the climate below 2 degrees.

In parallel to the assessment work, en.lighten is convening experts from
over 30 developing and developed countries and various sectors, including;
governments, civil society and private sector, to develop a draft road-map
for the global phase-out of inefficient lighting.. The road map will
include policy, technical and financial recommendations to support this
transition. UNEP expects the draft road map to be tabled for global
consultation in the second half of 2011.

Mr. Steiner added: “Among the low hanging fruit in the climate change
challenge, a switch to far more efficient lighting must rank as among the
lowest. There are multiple cost effective opportunities for rapidly
bridging the near term ‘Gigatone gaps’ from sharp increases in renewable
energy to cuts in non-C02 pollutants such as methane and black
carbon—readily available, efficient lighting systems is one path that is
literally available at the flip of a policy switch”.

Key Lighting Facts

Globally, 50 to 70 per cent of total lighting market sales are still of
inefficient incandescent lamps. A market shift, from incandescent lamps to
energy-efficient alternatives, would cut the world’s electricity demand for
lighting by over 2 per cent.
A report by US Global Industry Analysts Inc indicates that by 2010, the
industrial, commercial, residential and public lighting market will exceed
US $94 billion with a great deal of the growth in developing economies.
Using current economic and energy-efficiency trends, it is projected that
global demand for artificial light will be 80 per cent higher by 2030 if no
switch occurs with a great deal of that linked to the construction and
operation of new buildings in developing economies including China.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimated in 2007, the total
electricity consumption due to lighting at 2650 TWh. This represents almost
19 per cent of global electricity use (15-17 per cent greater than nuclear
or hydro power).
The total global GHG emissions accrued to lighting electricity consumption
was estimated in 2005 by the IEA at 1,889 MtCO2 of which grid based
lighting systems contribute to 1,528 MtCO2. This is equivalent to
approximately 8 per cent of world emissions or 70 per cent of the world
passenger vehicle emissions

If lighting technologies and efficiencies do not improve, global lighting
electricity demand will reach almost twice the output of all modern nuclear
power plants amounting to 4250 TWh, (TerraWatt Hours).
Up to 95 per cent of the energy emitted by incandescent lamps is heat, and
their efficiency is inherently low. Comparing the two types of lighting,
incandescent bulbs last around 1,000 hours which is significantly shorter
than energy saving lamps, with life spans of 6,000 to 12,000 hours.
Some 40 countries are currently involved in transforming their lighting
markets including phase-downs and phase-outs of old bulbs including Cuba,
Australia and the 27 member states of the European Union the United States,
Canada and the Philippines.

Several other developing countries are already involved in efforts to
promote the adoption of CFLs and to phase-out incandescent lamps—some with
GEF support and the involvement of the UN Development Programme (UNDP) and
the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

These include China, Russia, Viet-Nam, Morocco andCote d’Ivoire

Historically, the main barrier hampering the deployment of energy-efficient
lighting products was their high initial cost.

When first launched in the early 1980s, CFLs were 20 to 30 times more
expensive to produce than their incandescent equivalents. However, CFL
costs have steadily declined through use and increased competition. They
now retail for about four times the price of an incandescent lamp.

Consumers have traditionally been slow to come on board and according to
some reports, were initially unimpressed by early models, disliking the
look and functionality of early models.

Manufacturers say consumers need to understand how using energy saving
bulbs will allow for long term cost savings, as well as be assured of the
quality and reliability of new models.
Like all fluorescent lamps, CFLs contain mercury, which complicates their
disposal. Mercury is a hazardous substance in fluorescent lamps.

The average mercury content in a CFL bulb is about 3 milligrams – roughly
the amount it would take to cover the tip of a ball-point pen. By
comparison, older thermometers contain 500 milligrams of mercury – the
equivalent of more than 100 CFLs
Experts emphasize that mercury is also emitted from coal-fired power
stations. Studies indicate that the level of emissions from power stations
linked with lighting the world’s old bulbs are far higher than those linked
with the disposal of energy efficient bulbs.
Some manufacturers have voluntarily reduced the mercury content in CFLs by
about 80 per cent in the past decade, to as little as 2 mg per bulb.

Research is ongoing to achieve further mercury reductions.

One promising innovation in non-domestic lighting is the development of
solid state lighting (SSL).

This technology is expected to achieve efficiencies at least ten times
higher than incandescent lamps and up to twice as high as fluorescent
lamps.

Light Emitting Diode (LED) lamps, aside from not containing mercury have
other advantages such as long life, warm light colour similar to
incandescent lamps, low heat generation and the ability to work with
dimming switches in certain lamps.

The en.lighten initiative—Efficient Lighting for Developing and Emerging
Countries- including the 100 Country Lighting Assessment is available at:
www.enlighten-initiative.org

by CRISTINA MIRCEA /

“There are clearly three dominant players right now and then the rest of the world that cares a lot about this. There’s the U.S., there’s the European Union and there’s China. Copenhagen was essentially the U.S. and China saying ‘ we’re not going to do very much’. Europe was left on the sidelines.” ( Jeffrey Sachs, Economics Professor and Director of the “Earth Institute”)

Jeffrey Sachs, Earth Institute, Columbia University, New York

In a world that unanimously faces a dire reality due to climate changes and environment degradation and an even more gloomy future ahead, the global responsibility and involvement regarding climate action is unequally divided. Jeffrey Sachs, Economics Professor and Director of the “Earth Institute” makes an assessment of the global position concerning this issue.

The United States barrier in Climate Action

The U.S. remain trapped and essentially paralyzed as they have been on any national scale policy since 1994 and will be allergic to any global agreements in the future too. The only thing on which the American movement might be possible within the U.S. is the “alternative energy sources”, mainly around the theme of energy security and reduced oil dependence, from which the climate will benefit due to some of the steps taken. A large part of the U.S. is most likely to face a rapid development of natural gas deposits, because there are very big economic interests behind this action and a lot of public relations and lobbying efforts will be devoted to tremendous expansion of natural gas development under the pretext of clean energy, even though cleaner than coal doesn’t mean less CO2 ahead.

Even in the midst of the oil spill disasters in the Gulf that the American public opinion was against the cap and tended to favor the continuously deep ocean oil drilling, even within the region of the Gulf itself, which was the environmentally impacted region.

U.S. is also very allergic to helping other countries or giving money to the most disadvantaged ones.

“U. S. is very allergic to giving money to other countries, except for wars, especially when it comes for purposes of development or environment the U.S. people see no use to give money to poor people or to other countries, so when we try to assemble climate financing, the U.S. remains pretty much against any clear action. It was not so hard for secretary of state Clinton to endorse a hundred billion dollars from somewhere, somehow, by some mechanism in 2020 but getting a penny out of that today would be pretty much impossible.  So big numbers in the future that are fairly empty and meaningless are not so hard, but anything that has a specific mechanism attached to it it’s probably impossible”, asserts Sachs.

Media also has a significant influence on the American people. The opinion surveys show that about half of the U.S. population believes that there is no such thing as human induced climate change. The American people are confused and they relentlessly face an antiscientific propaganda from major fossil fuel industries such as Koch Industries, who spend millions of dollars in that direction. The odd media has reached a level of irresponsibility almost beyond belief in its only purpose of making more money. The most impactful newspaper in the United States is “The Wall Street Journal”, which has a disgraceful, antiscientific, propagandistic editorial page.

„Its editorial page is nothing short of disgraceful. It is absolutely a stupendously, propagandistic, antiscientific load of crap and sometimes I feel that the only purpose of it it’s to get my blood boiling in the morning“, says Sachs. The most watched cable network is Fox Television, also owned by the same owner as the Wall Street Journal, who is creating a mass and is very successful in his attempt to make money.

Even though the U.S. has a modest progress in solar power with new projects announced and approved in the Mojave Desert, some investments in electric vehicles, it is generally paralyzed in taking major steps, developing major plans or strategic actions. The status quo is very powerful, congressmen devoted for the cap and trade are going to lose their job subsequently to the elections, the political balance swings against president Obama and the administration will come to Cancun with very little.

“The United States is the outliner country, it is the least common denominator, even more than China, and I believe it poses the most significant barrier to effective action in the whole world at this issue right now and I think the world should say it very clearly. I am very skeptical of my own country and waiting on the United States to participate would mean waiting for a long long time. In the end the U.S. will come along, just like Winston Churchill said:  ‘The United States will always come to the right answer after it’s tried everything else’  and I have a feeling that’s going to be true once again, concludes Sachs.

China, Mexico and Cancun expectations

The global reality follows quite a bit the U.S.’s position and China is a good example in this context. It has major investments in low carbon sources and expansion of nuclear, solar, wind and other renewable sources on one hand and major investments in carbon energy, expansion of gasoline use and therefore petroleum import, on the other hand.

Mexico is fighting a bold and honorable effort to make the most of Cancun and president Calderón is very well determined to host a worthwhile conference but he faces long odds and it’s very hard to stay enthusiastic about the Cancun meeting when looking at the big picture. There is a hope to decide on a few practical matters on Cancun, such as creating a series of technology centers, finding finance, even though there are a lot of doubts about who’s coming to the table, except for maybe Japan or the E.U. Also one of the most important goals for Cancun is trying to bring the business community more into the process, because the normal climate processes are led by diplomats who are not operational nor business people, management or technology experts, thus making the whole intergovernmental negotiating process flawed.

Europe‘s leadership in fighting climate change.

Cap& trade flaws.

Europe has without question the most serious climate policy of any region in the world. Its enormous vulnerability to global climate change puts at stake the quality of life in Spain, Italy, Greece, France and so forth, thus Europe is very serious concerning this matter. But the deep economic crisis and the insufficient cooperation from states outside Europe are not helping.

Also it made one mistake and that is to suppose that the Europe Trading System will become a World Trading System and that was never a realistic plan. The best thing for Europe right now would be to try and simplify matters by quitting the trading system, because not a lot more is gained through it, and move to carbon taxation and feed-in tariffs, which can accomplish just as much with lower transaction costs, more predictability and more public understanding. Europe has ended up with a mix of them.

“Personally I am not a fan of the cap and trade, I believe it’s a process designed for two main reasons: one is to avoid using the word tax and second to facilitate the trading activities by Wallstreet and by banks. I would never have gone down that road myself and I would have recommended carbon taxation and technology regulation and feed-in tariff system”, says Sachs.

Europe should also be urged to continue taking the lead regarding climate actions, because it has the capacity to do it but it just needs to understand the politics very clearly and to get used to the two most important facts: that there’s not going to be a World Trading System for carbon and that it’s hopeless to see a partner in the U.S., because there isn’t one and it’s not going to be for some years. The chance of U.S. joining the trading system, especially over the next two years, is almost zero and also very small in general, because U.S. has declined it for the last 13 years and Obama didn’t come any close.

The Russian Artist Nina Nikiforova is globe-trotting with her project Turning Civilization’s Waste into Art – Without Frontiers. Her approach to art and to environmentalism takes you to one of the best books ever written and, most probably, the coolest concept in environmental literature: cradle to cradle. Just like Michael Braungart and William McDonough, Nina Nikiforova believes that using fire to fight “waste” is medieval behaviour. “It is a type of paranoia. When people feel insecure, they fall back to such behaviour. the cradle to cradle approach is to see waste as food, as nutrient for what is to come. it is about how to support the biosphere and how to support the technosphere. It is about being beneficial, about not panicking and destroying resources that we can pass onto our grandchildren and their grandchildren.”

Nikiforova embraced aesthetics in a Baudelaire-ish and figurative stance; dump, grunge or waste littered on the Black Sea’s shore became an act of art and an act of learning about the Earth. She works with students of all ages she is globe-trotting tirelessly and passes along her sensibility and skills.

For a preview of her art browse http://ninagallery.ru/gallery/. I encountered Nikiforova at the Peasant’s Museum in Bucharest, Romania during an expo organized by Belaia Loshadi Gallery from Russia and Terra Mileniul III Foundation.

Nowadays the green market has become an undeniable reality which has evolved  from the status of “environmental movement” into a large-scale business that can no longer be ignored. Large companies with turnovers of billions of dollars increasingly incorporate the green concept in their activities, thus sustaining this growing market,  for environmental purposes or merely for greenwashing.

How do we define a green business?

One of the issues that emerges is the lack of an accurate definition for this concept, despite the fact that the environmental movement caught wings over the worldwide business. Any normal market needs to have clear rules and standards in order to be successful.

Recycling the cartons from your building, putting double-glazed windows or using seclusive ‘add-ons’ doesn’t mean you run a green business. There is a mix of interrelated elements that refer to energy, construction, transportation, information technology, all of them converging.

Joel Makower, the notorious “green business guru”, tries to give us  a more correct and thorough definition of  the “green business” term, helping us to understand the difference between “greenwashing” and the truly green operations developed by companies.

” Generally speaking,  I see the green business as one that integrates ecological thinking into its operations and makes it in a manner that delineates an essential business strategy, not just disparate elements. Each operation within a company must be part of the green business. I have studied these things for over 20 years now, and initially, every company had an “environmental leader”, usually an engineer, sometimes a lawyer, who was in charge with different operations in terms of aligning the company to certain environmental standards. The idea was: we put someone in an office and he will deal with the environment. Nowadays they’re everywhere: in acquisitions, product design, operations, sales and marketing, human resources, finance, accounting and others. It’s everyone’s responsibility. Each employee or manager takes care of the environmental impact of his operations as part of his mission or responsibility in the company.”

Leap-frogging development for emerging economies

The green market has an uneven growth throughout the world. Economically developed countries have a stronger grasp on the “green” concept. Big corporations across the U.S. for example, already see it as part of their business as usual. Procter&Gamble has the problem of water use as part of the design protocols for each product. Each product requires water and the Management Department is concerned with how to operate these products in a world in which water insufficiency tends to become a dire reality.

A publishing house in Wisconsin became aware of its overconsumption of ink in its operations and the high costs involved in acquisition and revaluation of the ink as waste, so the Management came up with a business and production plan to minimize that consumption.

” I was their counselor for a while and found that the system works. I then asked the manager of that relatively large company (which has over 9000 employees) how many environmental employees do they have within the company.  His answer was ‘Over 9000′. That’s the idea! “, explains Makeower.

These kind of examples are commonly found across the U.S., where the technology and developed economy helped strengthening such a mentality, whereas less developed countries such as India, China and those from Eastern Europe are still struggling to catch up and they are doing it at a much faster pace.

” What I observed concerning emerging economies is the development in leaps (leap-frogging). Even if they don’t build green buildings and major industries are difficultly upgraded , businesses adapt to new technologies that have evolved with a relatively small step in the West. The classic example is the mobile phone. Few families had fixed telephone lines, but almost everyone has cell phones. High technology meets the economic need to communicate because it is obviously cheaper and because its application does not require investments in infrastructure”, asserts Makower.

Greenwashing vs. green-business. Can greenwashing be positive in any way?

A large number of companies that have serious problems with upgrading or polluting rivers build urban parks and organize events on the bike, thinking they can justify the damage brought to the environment by some good but small things.Some claim that the mere display of an environmentalist speech from the company is positive for community progress. There are many people who sincerely believe greenwashing is a positive thing.

” Many companies want to become green.This gives birth to a dialogue that has not existed before. True, that’s a good thing, but even more important is what happens once that dialogue begins. Does it stop there and the Management says ‘hey, we’re green!’ or does it start a real conversation between business and activities. If you beat up your wife, don’t expect to be forgiven just because you bring home some gifts for your children. The real issue here is not that they pollute( don’t get me wrong, pollution is a problem!), but the fact that they claim to be green. Companies are beginning to have problems when their own perceptions are considered true. Is the say/do gap. They need to improve their technology, to reduce the environmental impact and to do nice things for the community, in any way they want. I think that one thing often gets lost in this conversation: environmentally responsible companies tend to be better managed companies, are more efficient, have the ability to attract and retain talents and operate more efficiently”, concludes Makower.

Joel Makower authored Strategies for the Green Economy. The book distills his more than twenty years of watching the green business scene and offers insights and inspiration for understanding and untangling the complexities and controversies of profiting in the growing green economy. He is the leader of Greener World Media and founder of GreenBiz.com.

Interview carried out by Raul Cazan

Edited by Cristina Mircea

By Beth Oppenheim

Eating Animals by one of my favorite fellow Jews, Jonathan Safran Foer. He is the author of such works as Everything is Illuminated which was ultimately turned into a type of dark comedy starring Elijah Wood. His works have always been unique, and from a distinct perspective. He rights as who he is, even in his fiction. He is a Jewish American descended from Holocaust survivors. Same as me, actually.

These are probably reasons why I like his writing so much. He doesn’t hide behind a facade of objectivity, and he writes what he knows. In this nonfiction work, he crosses the line from writer to full-blown activist, and I am really glad he did.

I first learned about his book because of the New York Times magazine Food Issue, where Foer wrote about his experience in abridged form. The article simply got my juices flowing for what was to come: an expose about the food industry, as it relates to Foer’s vegetarianism, and his choice to raise his son as a vegetarian.

From the beginning, it is clear that Foer has spent much of this process being extremely conflicted. He visits farms undercover, recounts much of the gruesome detail of factory farming reality, all the while leading the reader towards a bigger and more intellectual argument.

He shares stories of his grandmother, a Holocaust survivor that ate whatever she could find in order to survive. She recounts to him a time where a Russian fighter (“God bless him!”) offered her meat in her most desperate state. She declined. “But why?!” Foer wants to know. She teaches us all a lesson that because it was pork, a meat forbidden in the Jewish faith, she was unable to eat it. She shows us that if there is nothing to distinguish a person, there is nothing worth saving.

I guess I should come clean and say that this is BY FAR not the first book I have read on farming, sustainable food, food safety, the agro-business industry, or any other related topics. I have read many – and Foer has too. His discussion of some of the modern day heroes of the local food movement is, in fact, where Foer makes his most compelling points. We all can hear about electrocuting turkeys and be horrified, but disagreeing with Michael Pollan? This I gotta hear!

Foer doesn’t disagree entirely with many of the people who have exposed factory farming for what it legitimately is: disgusting. It can be a lot of other things too – but the descriptions written in this text are evocative of disgust first and foremost. He explains that Pollan falls short in the work The Omnivore’s Dilemma of telling people to flat out make a decision: Are you going to eat meat, or aren’t you? This is true. Pollan suggests a dilemma of proportions that he is not able to solve alone.

Is it better to eat meat that is sustainably farmed, or is it better not to eat it at all? In the end, Foer pushes for the latter. I am still debating whether I loved or was confused by his conclusions, but ultimately his work is a really accessible way to show others what issues are at stake, and what we can ultimately decide about them.

by Beth Oppenheim

This morning, I finished The Zookeeper’s Wife, a book by nature writer Diane Ackerman. The book itself was actually an accidental read. My mother had purchased it at the bookstore, and was trying to figure out what book to read next when I suddenly picked it up and started reading it.

The work takes place during World War 2 in Warsaw, Poland. It is based on Ackerman’s research of two main characters, Jan and Antonina that run the Warsaw Zoo and use it as a front to save Jews during the war. The context is powerful, and therefore could either be an extremely depressing or uplifting read – as most Holocaust books are.

I have been to Warsaw, and have walked the streets where many nations have made their stand. I have sat inside the Ghetto walls and looked at the many cement buildings that have many stories to tell. It was the dead of February when I was in Poland, and that added all the more to the feeling of gloom. Ackerman conveys a different feel about everything related to Warsaw, which is the one thing I appreciated the most about the book.

She portrays it as a thriving city full of culture, stories, and history – NOT some forgotten communist haunt, and a place where many Poles turned against their fellow Jew. Many did, I’m sure – and nearly two thirds of the Warsaw population died in the war. However, her concentration on the human nature and salvation of many of these people makes it an uplifting read.

It also reads more like a memoir than a historical account, which I absolutely loved and attributed to Ackerman’s thoughtful research of the subject. Antonina was a complex woman who felt very deeply for the fate of the animals in her zoo. Many were killed in 1939, when the Germans first invaded Poland. She describes with horror the killing of elephants, wild cats, and many other exotic and well-cared-for animals.

BUT Ackerman proudly makes Antonina into a complex character that sees the pain of animals, and doesn’t equate it to that of human suffering. The author plays with the idea of who the animal really is, and what they have endured. Are the Germans animals, because of how they treated their fellow man? Are the Jews animals, because they were hunted? Or are we all really animals, vulnerable and looking for someone like Antonina to take care of us?

Her tone is impeccably descriptive, and at the same time not dense. The New York Times book review in 2007 described it difficult for the reader to switch back and forth between the atmosphere of the zoo and of the war story. I however found this to be precisely the point. The zoo and the saving of 300 or more Jews was something separate from the terror erupting outside, and I believe Ackerman made her point well.

This was  a surprising read that left me more curious about many of the other untold stories that exist from 1939-1945.

Sean Miller, director for Education at Earth Day Network in Washington, D.C. gives an interview on school greening and solar energy for schools.

by Mihai Stoica.

In his article published in Science in 1968, Garret Hardin argues that when a user of the common is faced with a choice that will bring him large individual gain at a small collective cost, i.e. adding a cow to one’s herd versus the impact on the common, the herdsman will always act in his own self interest and put more and more cattle on the pasture, thus the pasture will inevitably deteriorate.

In his theory, Hardin fails to account for that the very existence of the commons implies cooperative management and ownership. Cooperative management tries to achieve more effective and equitable systems of resource management. It works on the basis of joint decisions within the community and as long as community management is in place it cannot be privatized. Thus, Hardin’s herdsman would not have been able to decide by himself how many cattle to put on the pasture.

If we stop to take a look at the self-regulation process that was known in England as “stinting”, which meant establishing limits for the number of cows, sheep or pigs that each commoner could graze on the common pasture, we notice that experienced farmers knew how to protect their land from being overused (the notion of carrying capacity) and allowed the community to allocate resources accordingly.

A similar case, but involving a different type of resource is the qanat (irrigation system) in an oasis environment in Ghardaia, Algeria. Water is a very scarce resource in the M’zab Valley in the Sahara. The inhabitants – the Ibadites – settled here close to a millennium ago and built a system of canals which is in use to this day. The access to water is regulated according to the number of date trees on each plantation belonging to a household, but the maximum number of allowed date trees is also regulated. This system of equitable water distribution and self-governance has ensured not only their survival, but has also made them thrive in the harshest of the environments.

The system of the commons has many advantages, but it also has to be clearly defined. What is meant by that is:
territorial boundaries must be clear in order to allocate resources effectively;
it works best in small-scale and homogenous communities (e.g. the community in Ghardaia is threatened nowadays by a modern phenomenon – urban sprawl – which threatens its water supply);
local knowledge is used in decision making.

The advantages that it brings are clear: it can improve education, empowers local communities and emphasizes long-term sustainability.

Garret Hardin’s thesis on the tragedy of the commons fails to account for the fact that competition has not always been a driving force in human societies. He builds his model according to a neoliberal capitalist ideology based on competition and profit, contrary to the very notion of the common where the poor could not have survived if they did not participate in the economies of cooperation and mutuality. Also, his approach founded on the model of the English commons is not based on a review of the economic history of the commons.

For centuries, land has been managed successfully by communities. This system is still in place today in countries like Algeria or India, especially in the former where the limited access to water is best managed by such a system. In conclusion, we cannot talk about a “tragedy of the commons”, but a triumph ensuring sustainability on the long term.

Bibliography:
Angela D. (2003) Saving the Oasis, Beaver County Times (March 2)
G. Hardin (1968) The tragedy of the commons, Science, vol. 162, no. 3859 (December 13)
F. Berkes, D. Feeny, B.J. McCay, and J.M. Acheson (1989) The benefits of the commons, Nature, no. 340 (July 13)
V. Shiva (2005) Earth Democracy – Justice, Sustainability and Peace, Cambridge, MA: South End Press
Susan S. Hanna (1990) The Eighteenth Century English Commons: A Model for Ocean Management